Quote Originally Posted by Rank amateur View Post
Excellent point. I came to the opposite conclusion based on the data: that insurgents believe IEDs are by far their most effective method of attack. They only resort to other methods - less effective methods - when they've placed IEDs everywhere they can.
Matt's presumption is this:

The inferiority of IED attacks suggests that insurgents would prefer to be engaging in non-IED attacks, probably because the long-term gains from IED attacks are small. Non-IED attacks hold out the promise of control of territory, and with it, political legitimacy.
It is a valid point. However the logic applies more to domestic actors in a civil war than external actors. In the case of the latter, the insurgents may be able to manipulate the cost/benefit calculations of the external actor to the point that they decide to leave (France in Algeria and Vietnam, the British in Aden, and perhaps the US in Iraq).

Domestic combatants rarely have such an option to "exit."